


again (and again)

by therewasagirl



Series: Of The Wretched [2]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-19
Updated: 2017-10-19
Packaged: 2019-01-20 00:28:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12421308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therewasagirl/pseuds/therewasagirl
Summary: Do you have any idea on how it feels to be found after being lost for so long?





	1. ii.i

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decided a few nights ago that i was going to change the structure of ‘Of The Wretched’.
> 
> it’s still the same story, nothing changes, but i started writing that story totally on the fly and halfway through i started giving these characters/universe a lot of backstory. so much that the backstory itself became its own story.
> 
> so im keeping it that way, the ‘flashbacks’, as the first part of the tale, and the ‘present time’ as its sequel (aka this one)
> 
> basically what im doing is, taking the first chapters and putting them in their own story, just because it feels cleaner, structurally speaking. while the way it is now, it feels like im telling 2 stories at once.

"Le monde a soif d'amour —tu viendras l'apaiser.  
_The world is parched for love —you will come and quench its thirst."_

_\-  Arthur Rimbaud, excerpt of 'Soleil et Chair'_

Felicity slumped even more in her seat, squirming to find a more comfortable spot and failing. Thea was asleep in hers, looking pale, her forehead covered in a thin layer of sweat, but breathing steadily.

Felicity looked at her unblinkingly for a long moment. Eve as she focused on counting Thea’s breaths, it was impossible not to remember how she’d stumbled back and fallen when the bullet had gone through her. How for one short, heart-stopping moment, Felicity had thought… she’d thought…

She turned her eyes back at the window, staring that the dark sky, but there was no way that even the limpid night and the countless stars could distract her from the hellish week she’d had. Her  brain wouldn’t stop wheeling. It wasn’t the first time she wished she could just  _forget_ things, but she hadn’t been made that way.

God, she was exhausted. They’d been in the air for almost twelve hours, jumping from airport to airport under five different identities. When Felicity dared to think that Moira had been capable of arranging all this, she felt her stomach roll.

That woman was…

Felicity rubbed the tips of her fingers against her eyelids. She was sorely hoping that Moira Queen and Amanda Waller would never ever meet, or there would be no hope for mankind.

Honestly though, it wasn’t like she hadn’t had an equally illegal and – she grumpily had to admit - far less  _secure_ exit strategy in place for all of them anyway. They’d just had to fall back on Moira’s plan because their enemies were far more dangerous than anyone she had ever thought they would face, and they all needed safe time to formulate a plan.  And rest. …And breathe a little.

Felicity sighed. It wasn’t good form of her to turn her nose up and Moira’s schemes anyway. She’d been complicit to some very questionable activities in the later year and a half of her life, so…

The worst of it was that she wasn’t even sorry. And she was sure that if a certain someone stepped into her office again, asking for her help, she would do it all over again and not change a thing.

Yeah, no, that wasn’t right… She would do  _some_ things better, more efficiently maybe. But for someone who knew so well the bitter bite of regret when it crawled in her bed during her many sleepless nights, Felicity was happy to say that she didn’t regret her choice at all.

Felicity didn’t know what that said about he, though.

Maybe she and Moira had more in common than their cool relationship had ever allowed them to share. Who knew? At this point, Felicity was sure she would never find out.

And with that, she gave into her restlessness and got up, walked down the narrow lane of the plane, to where the coffee lived. She needed to make her peace with this situation, one way or another, she firmly told herself. She needed to accept that she was an international fugitive now. That she was being smuggled across the world and into a literal Secret Assassin base.

_God…_

Her life hadn’t made sense by normal standards for a while, but this took the fucking cake.

Her hand shook as she poured the coffee. It spilled.

Felicity put the thermos down hard and then winced. She held very still,, not even daring to breathe, listening if the noise had stirred Thea out of the first quiet sleep she’d had in hours. It hadn’t. Felicity took a deep breath, tried to calm down. Thea had the senses of a wild cat usually, but she was beyond exhausted. After all, it’s not every day that your father is exposed as the city’s vigilante and your name hits the papers as his fast-footed sidekick, along with you ex sister in law. No, things like those didn’t really happen every day, not even to them.

Neither did car bombs and an almost-assassination.

God, that had been such a close call that Felicity felt her knees go weak ever time she thought about it too long. The only reason Thea was alive now as because Robert had gotten her out of the way in time and because that crazy old man had dared to perform an emergency transfusion on his daughter when he’d realized she would die of poisoning and not of the bullet. Right there in lobby of Queen Consolidated he’d opened a vein and given Thea his blood to save her life.

Felicity sat down on the plush carpet, put her back to the side of the plane and pulled her knees up, hid her face against them. Breathed deep and steady as she tried to clear her mind of that particular memory.

There was so much blood in the human body… how is it that she’d never known that?

No, her life wasn’t ordinary at all. And she'd been happy with that. She just wished she knew how to deal with  _this_ too. She'd been trying for the last twelve hours. Even as she laid down on the soft carpeted floor of the plane, she still had no answer.

+

Nanda Parbat meant the Mountain, apparently. Or something. It sure wasn’t an easy trek getting there though. The heat alone was enough to melt the skin beneath their clothes. The fact that they had to walk uphill under that  baking sun was just the cherry on top of the shitcake.

Thea heaved and Felicity held her wais more securely, though she was out of breath herself.

"Just a little further." Digg reassured them, as he walked ahead, a gun on this hand and  both eyes wide open. "According to the coordinates Robert gave us, we're almost two miles away."

Felicity looked at Thea, took in the pallor of her face and the dots of sweat on her forehead.

"John."

Digg turned, took one look at Thea and was by her side in a moment, lips pursed, almost angry.

"Queen stubbornness." he muttered, as he took the girl's pulse. "Why didn’t you say something?"

The huffed a laugh. "I’m fine."

"Yeah you sound like it."

Thea just took another raspy breath, closing her eyes as if the effort required concentration. Felicity felt the twinge of guilt growing more insistent. She should have noticed sooner.

"Ok. I feel better now." Thea said thickly, trying to get up again. "I can walk some more."

Digg put a hand on her shoulder.

"I don’t think so.” And then he smiled for the first time in a few days. “How do you feel about piggy back rides, Speedy?"

Thea's eyes glazed over for a moment before she closed them, shaking her head minutely. Felicity knew what she would say before the words were even out of the girl's mouth.

"Ollie used to piggyback me around the house all the time."

Digg nodded. "Then you know the rules."

He turned, bending his knees so she could climb on his back. It must have been a measure of the pain Thea was in that she looped her arms loosely around John's neck and shoulders and let him pick her up without the smallest protest.

John got up as if he didn’t feel her weight at all. To be fair, Thea  _was_ tiny, but Felicity knew that the girl was no feather. She looked lanky but she was all muscle and deadly knees and elbows.

John passed Felicity the GPS tracker. They kept moving, sweating through every layer of clothing they were wearing. After some twenty minutes of walking, Thea piped up.

“You ok, John?”

John only chuckled. He was hardly out of breath.

“Give me a break, kid. I’ve carried gear through the dessert that weighed twice more than you do.”

Thea said nothing, but as she turned her face to rest her cheek against John’s shoulder, Felicity could see her little smile. It wasn’t even 20 minutes later however, that an arrow ebbed itself right in front of John's feet.

They stopped. From a distance, the people up in the hill looked like flickering shadows but the projectile weapon embed at their feet meant they were very much real.

"You may go no further," a booming voice said, the tilting accent doing nothing to hinder Felicity’s understanding of the words.

She stepped forward. This was her part now.

"My name is Felicity Smoak," she said, as loudly and steadily as she could. "This is John Diggle and Thea Queen. We were told our coming here was expected."

She didn’t know whether to be relieved or not when the figures on the hill put their weapons down. As it was, they had run out of choices days ago, so there was nothing they could do but to follow when they were told to do so.

+

Felicity felt dizzy once or twice as  they walked up the narrow paths up the mountains. She tried very hard never to glance over her shoulder - the drop was so deep and sharp that Felicity couldn’t see the bottom of the canyon. The abyss seemed to call at her with its own force of gravity.

God, she  _hated_ heights!

Once they got close enough, they could see the League stronghold through the thin fog. It was a building, a castle of sorts, but it looked like it had been carved right into the face of the mountain.

She saw him just as they stepped inside the castle’s walls and into the cavernous hall.

Even when Moira had mentioned him by name, laying out their plan of getting her and Thea out of the country and somewhere safe enough, Felicity had told her she’d believe it when she saw it. And now  _he_ was standing  _right there_ , she was seeing it - seeing  _him_ – and still… Felicity could hardly make sense of it all.

As she met Malcolm Merlyn’s eyes in that hall so big she couldn’t see the ceiling of… she wanted to release the kind of string of curses that she hadn’t indulged in since she was in college and taunting the smirk off frat boys’ faces.

"Felicity. It is good to see you after so long." he said as he stepped forward, long black robes flowing behind him.

“Malcolm… It hasn’t been nearly long enough, so I really can’t say the same."

He smiled, though his eyes were cold. The smirk fell off his face when he saw Thea being carried in by John and laid into an awaiting stretcher.

The words Malcolm spoke in Arabic were completely foreign to Felicity, but they made two men move as if his voice commanded them. When they grabbed Thea’s stretcher and made to carry her away, Felicity and Diggle moved to follow them. There was no way in hell - and she might very well be  _in_ it - that Felicity was leaving Thea alone in this godforsaken place.

"You have not been dismissed." Malcolm said simply and just like that, a blade was at her throat so quickly and silently that Felicity almost walked right into it, but Diggle pulled her backwards.

Felicity turned burning eyes to her once-stepfather.

"I’m not interested in chitchatting with you about old times, Malcolm. Where are they taking her?"

"To the healing rooms, where she will be most carefully cared for."

"I don’t believe you." She spit back, but the weapons at her throat didn’t move and when Felicity tried to move despite the threat of the gleaming blade, Digg held her tighter. She glared at them, but knew the truth. Those men would not relent, if Malcolm did not say so. It wasn’t them that they had to deal with.

"What do you  _want_ , Malcolm." Felicity asked, for the first time her voice showing her exhaustion.

"What any man wants, of course." he said with a smile. “I just want more of it.”

She imagined scratching her nails down his face. What he wanted, was for her to be very aware of who exactly was in control here.

“Are we going to stand here until you get it, by any chance?”

"Of course not. Forgive my bad manners. You will be escorted to your rooms immediately."

"I will be escorted to wherever Thea is going to be.  _That_ will be my rooms, thank you." Felicity said quietly. She’d learned that from him, because of him.

At her most hateful, she always became quiet.

Malcolm's smile remained the same, but his eyes hardened. He stepped closer in her space. Diggle tensed.

"Felicity, you were always a bright girl, so I expect you to understand a very simple concept while you’re here.” He lowered his voice, softened his tone. His eyes remained as empty of real feeling as they’d ever been. “This is not a reenactment of your teenage years. You are in a foreign domain and you must show respect for its rules, or you will be punished accordingly."

"I will show you the respect you deserve, Malcolm." She replied coolly. "As I always have."

He sighed, shook his head in disappointment.

Felicity bit back her scowl.

He could go fuck himself. Tommy might have been more vulnerable to his manipulations, because Malcolm had started early with his emotional violence on his son, but Felicity was a different matter. She’d seen right through the fucker from the very first time she’d met him, even if her own mother hadn’t.

"This is a different country, Felicity, a different culture.” Malcolm explained, almost sounding patient. It only had made Felicity despise him more. “Do not be so thoughtlessly arrogant as to think that you can ignore its customs because you feel somehow superior to them. Here different rules apply."

She snorted. "You're as much of a foreigner here as I am, Malcolm. Don’t talk to me about respect, you’re one of the most racist people I’ve ever met."

Malcolm's lips pinched.

Felicity didn’t understand what he said, but Digg did, so when two men moved to catch a hold of her arms, he fought back. He was put down within moments… and that’s when Felicity really started to be afraid. She screamed and kicked, but it did little difference. She was hauled away as if she weighed nothing, the grip of powerful hands so strong around her upper arms and wrists that she thought her bones would snap. She still fought all the way to a set of double doors. They were opened and she was thrown in.

She almost face-planted on the stone floor, but broke her fall with on hands and knees instead. It didn’t seem to hurt any less. Her glasses fell off her face, landing a couple of feet from her. The impact hurt so much that she felt it vibrating all the way to her hips and shoulders. She struggled to get up but the pain and exhausting got so overpowering that all she could do in that moment was press her face against the cool stone and let her body go.

She just wanted to lay there and sob her heart out.

But once she felt real tears gathering behind her eyes, she gritted her teeth and fought through them. She  _ordered_  her body to get up, ‘ _get up, Felicity._   _Get up!’_  until it obeyed. She managed to peel herself off the floor and examine the damage. Focus on the menial stuff, the practical stuff. She’d scrapped her palms and knees bloody. Her jeans were torn at the knee.

It was with an astounding amount of detachment that she observed this. The throbbing pain came as if through a bussing screen of bees in her head.

She went to the door and pulled. It  didn’t give a single inch.

Felicity has known it would be locked. Malcolm had locked her in her room before. She'd broken her arm that time, when she’d fallen from the second floor trying to scale out of the window instead.

 _Silver lining_ , Felicity thought as she rested her forehead against the hard wooden surface: at least there are no broken bones this time.

Felicity felt her head spin as she stood there. She was battered, exhausted, had slept for only about three hours during the last forty-eight and couldn’t even remember the last full meal she’d had. There was a party in her head and dehydration was the guest of honor.

She needed to think. She needed…

She needed to clean up, Felicity decided. Drink some water, clean her face, hands, knees. She dragged her feet to the couch, sat down, just to think some. Was there a bathroom in here?

Next thing she knew, she was being gently shaken by the shoulder.

She startled awake, heart hammering. It was Digg’s familiar face that she saw but she still tried to jump to her feet. Then she had to sit again, her head spinning and her vision darkening.

"Easy." John said as he pushed her down to the couch again. "You need to rest Felicity."

"I need to see Thea.” She said, mind filled to bursting with the possibilities of what could have gone wrong with Thea as she slept away like the most careless caretaker on the planet. “Where is she? Do you know? John?"

"I just came from Thea's room.” John assured her. “She's better, and sleeping. Her fever is down.”

“Where…”

“Two halls down from here, second door to the right. I’m right across the hall from you. No, they didn’t hurt me.” His fingers tightened on her arm. “You have to sleep. I'll take first watch."

Felicity blinked. Her brain felt slow.

She must have agreed at some point, but she didn’t remember much of it. She didn’t remember Diggle helping her up, though the sting of him cleaning up her cuts and bruises did stand out among the hazy memories. She was glad she didn’t remember him helping her undress for bed, but maybe he hadn’t. She didn’t know. At this point it didn’t even matter, weird as that sounded.

They’d known each other for years. He'd seen her bruised and bloody, and in elegant dresses alike. He’d helped her when she had a bomb around her neck and pulled her crying and shocked self out of a crumbling building when the Foundry almost fell on her. She’d slept on his and Lyla’s couch more times than she cared to count and had breakfast with them in Yummy Sushi pajamas. The time when they’d hesitate to take care of each was long gone… though Felicity did wonder what Lyla would think about her husband taking off another woman’s clothes.

Lyla… Lyla who always found their ‘done with your shit’ faces hilariously alike. She said their mirrored each other.

Felicity could perfectly see her snorting about it.

She wished she could be more like Digg when it came to resilience, but apparently her body’s limits were way lower than his. Or Thea’s, Robert’s and Lyla’s.

She’d had no training for this, no preparation. She’d jumped head first into something dangerous because she, in her infinite arrogance, thought she’d always be able to make up as she went along, same as she always did. But for the first time, hidden among mountains, Felicity wished she’d thought everything through better. That she’d made fewer mistakes.

She found herself wishing for strength that felt like it was fast running out. And the last thought she remembered having was one of deep regret hollowing her.

+

The next day, Felicity didn’t leave Thea’s room. They had baths and dressed begrudgingly in the loose white robes that had been laid out for them, once they found out that their other clothes had been taken away. (  _she didn’t admit they the soft cotton felt comfortable on her only because it had been given to her on Malcolm’s orders. She was petty like that_ ). Felicity found that her tablet was missing too, but knowing that no matter how they tried, they would never be able to crack the security measures on her baby, gave her a fierce kind of pleasure.

Thea was feeling better too. She’d been as astounded as Felicity had felt when she saw Malcolm. She tracked him the whole time he was in the room. John did too, from the corner of the room, right behind Malcolm’s back. Felicity had spent enough time around warriors to know when they were on their guard.

Malcolm though looked as at ease as ever.

“I hope you recover well, Thea, and that you find your stay here pleasing.”

That’s what he’d said before leaving. Thea had just nodded. Once the door closed behind Malcolm, she turned wide eyes to Felicity.

“You know… I almost didn’t believe mom when she said that he was here. That he was…”

“Head of the Demon.” Felicity completed that thought when Thea seemed to stumble on the words. “Yeah, I didn’t either. I’d hoped he was dead.”

Thea didn’t say anything to that. She didn’t exactly share the… colder aspects of Felicity’s anger, but then again – and thank god – Thea didn’t know Malcolm well enough to hate him the way Felicity did.

It was an intimate kind of hatred, the one she felt. One that you learned through details; through learning all the shades of violence a human being was capable of inflicting on another without ever lifting a finger. And that was just from her years of living with that man.

But there were other things too.

Felicity had never been able to prove it, and Robert had never fully believed her, but she strongly suspected Malcolm had had something to do with what happened in the Glades last year. There had been too many coincidences for her to let it go, despite the fact that no matter how much she checked him up, Malcolm was clean as a whistle and so had been Merlyn Global. She just had a feeling about it.

But she couldn’t prove anything. And by the time they had understood what the Undertaking actually meant, it had been almost too late. Felicity had been able to hack into the Unidac files and decrypt them, but not in time to find out there were two machines. Three hundred and four people had died. Tommy would always be in some kind of level of pain form the wound he took – that rebar that had almost run him through. But Malcolm had disappeared months before that. Nobody had seen or heard from him for months.

And now they were here, under his fucking roof again.

“You plan on going to that thing he invited us?” Thea asked.

“I don’t see how we have a choice.” Digg said as he sat down on the ottoman close to the bed. “That didn’t really sound like an invitation to me.”

Felicity couldn’t have said it better. “Let’s keep our eyes open. Malcolm never does anything for nothing.”

Thea huffed, her misery plain in her face. “What more could we have to give?”

Felicity looked away.

Thea was probably thinking of all she left behind. Of her father standing trial for fifty different accounts of murder. Of her mother being under investigation as an accomplice. If they lost the trial, Robert could be sentenced to death.

Thea had been so determined to stay. Felicity had been too, and they  _would_ have stayed, if the attacks on them hadn’t started.

There had been three different attempts to kidnap her by the Triad alone since her name hit the press. One of them had almost succeeded, blowing up a floor of QC, just to create a diversion. Two of her best researches had ended up in intensive care because of it. Mina would never hear from her left ear again and there would be no reconstructive surgery good enough to take away the stars she would be left with on  the right side of her body. Dennis would need physical therapy for years to get even a small amount of mobility in his left leg, after the multiple fractures. Thea had almost  _died_ …

They  _still_ didn’t know who had leaked their identities.

For a moment, the thought came to Felicity that it might have been Malcolm, but she dismissed it.

Malcolm had nothing to gain from exposing the Hood. He had nothing to gain from setting them all up so that Thea and Felicity herself could end up here, of all places.

But then again, Felicity didn’t call herself an expert on the way a cold-hearted bastard’s mind worked. And with Malcolm, one could never know.

-

The hall where they had been ushered to looked a lot like Hogwarts’ Great Hall, but a lot creepier. Flickering flames keeping the lighting so dim that it made shadows seem like they were part of the architecture. She was smart enough to understand that that too was on purpose   People who called themselves with a pretentious name like ‘league of assassins’ probably winning any prizes on subtlety of method.

She walked side by side with Diggle and Thea. When they picked a table on the far side of the room and sat on the cushions, Thea leaned a bit on Felicity’s arm.

"How are you feeling?" Felicity asked immediately, wrapping her arm around Thea’s shoulders to pull her closer.

“A lot better actually.” She shrugged and there was barely a wince to show for it. “I guess there people have experience handling bleeding wounds. I am starting to question my parents sanity for calling this a ‘safe place’ however." she murmured.

"You shouldn’t."

Both girls looked up, and saw Malcolm towering over them.

He used to love sitting her and Tommy down and walking back and forth in front of them as he spoke at them.

"This is the last place anyone will ever find you, no matter how powerful Robert's enemies may be."

"It's not exactly street thugs we're worried about, Malcolm." Thea said. Felicity squeezed her hand.

_Don’t tell him anything._

Malcolm’s lips curve up in a small smile. "Oh, I know, Thea. Which is why I am glad to welcome the three of you, formally, to Nanda Parbat.”

Felicity doesn't blink or flinch when he turns to look at her, before leaving.

He must be having the time of his life, ruling this place and having so many deadly people at his back and call. The thought both sickened and frightened her. Malcolm was the sort of man who should never be allowed to have any kind of power. The fact that he had so much of it made Felicity worry.

This whole world was strange to her, not because of the foreignness, but because of the shadows. Men and women lived and died in them, speaking in whispers, their whole lives a big secret. They seemed to be from all over the world, and yet there was something about them, that made them look the same. Maybe it was the austere looks on their faces, or the fact that they seemed to be dressed all in almost exactly the same dark robes.

In fact, Felicity, Thea and Diggle were the only ones wearing white. And the only ones unarmed.

She watched the way people walked up to Malcolm and bowed to him; watched who he talked to, for how long and even tried to read his lips. When he unexpectedly met her eye, as if he’d been aware of her scrutiny the whole time. Felicity startled, but she didn’t look away. She may be in his power here, but he knew very well that she despised him. There was simply no point in pretending otherwise.

Malcolm smiled, sharp and cold, and looked away, turning to talk to the woman by his side – the only one whose black robes were bejeweled.

Felicity felt the little hair on her arms rise. No, she didn’t like being here at all.  

Without any warning, the double doors that led into the hall opened without warning. Felicity looked over immediately, tensing, just as Digg and Thea did. Twenty people, all dressed in the same way and heavily armed, strode in. Their faces were hidden beneath deep dark hoods, their weapons on their belts. They stopped right in front of the dais where Malcolm was sitting, shoved their hoods down and put their hands over their chests, bowed their heads. The women had their hair bound in tight braids close to their head. Some of the men kept it loose and others had cropped it so short that their hair was just a buzz close to their skulls.

Not for the first time, Felicity marveled at the irony of their situation. They had gotten out of Starling – off the  _continent_ \- to be safe from people meaning to kill them, or worse… and  _here_ they were, in the laps of even more ruthless killers.

What had they been doing for more than a year? What had  _she_ been doing? If  _this_ place was the only place on earth that could stand them, then all that she had done, all those horrible things she had helped do, to admittedly horrible people… what had they been for? Did they even mean anything? Was Amanda Waller right? Did they  _deserve_ to be hunted down like this?

Maybe they did. Maybe, if the only place where they could find safe haven was where Malcolm Merlyn dwelled, then they really had made a huge mistake and deserved everything that was coming to them.

This didn’t change Felicity's determination to make it out of this alive and intact - but it did at least shift her point of view.

Thea leaned closer to Digg.

"What is he saying?"

Digg expression was opaque, but she knew him well enough to recognize the anger in his eyes.

"They're reporting a successful joint mission in Damascus, London and Dubai." Digg murmured. "He's formally welcoming them, and informing them that the Mountain has guests."

"What?"

"Us." Digg explained.

But Felicity wasn’t really listening. She was still looking at all those people who were doing a crazy man's will like he was their god.

It surprised her, the strength of her hatred for Malcolm. She’d hated him almost from the moment she’d met him and even gone so far as to sabotage him every time she thought she could get away with it, but this was different.

How could someone like him be allowed to be here? Do this? Be the head of some revanchist killer association like this?

How  _dare_ Robert not tell her about it?

How…

"Oh my god..."

Felicity turned to Thea immediately.

She sounded breathless and scared and that tone would have caught her attention anywhere. “What is it? What’s the matter, Thea?”

But Thea’s eyes were fixed in front of her, squinting.

Felicity followed her gaze and she just… froze.

_What? No, not again, come on…_

Felicity closed her eyes. Took a deep breath.

It had been years since this had happened.  _Literal_ years. She’d thought it would never happen to her again. She’d thought…

It must be the flickering light of the torches. And the fact that she hadn’t slept in forever. And the dread that curdled her every thought.

It wasn’t  _real_. It never had been real.

She and Thea had had this problem for so long. Moira too probably, but Moira would rather die than admit that kind of weakness to Felicity.

Felicity had gotten over it quicker by sheer strength of will, but also because she wasn’t strong enough to do what Thea did: be willing to look for him everywhere, each day with a new heart, like it didn’t hurt.

But Thea was resilience personified.

Her fingers tightened around Felicity's wrist. It hurt, but not as much as the frail hope in Thea’s voice did.

"Felicity…"

"Thea,  _please_. It's not…"

"Stop! Just  _look_ at him!"

“Felicity…” Digg’s soft voice made her heart drop.

Thea might have made a mistake, she sometimes did, and Felicity might have built the self-protecting inertia of not believing her, but  _John_ … John had no reason to see ghosts.

Felicity turned her head, looked straight to where that man had been a moment ago.

He wasn’t there.

"To Malcolm's right." Thea directed her immediately. And that's when Felicity saw him.  _Truly_ saw him.

Saw the line of his jaw now that he’d turned, his close-cropped hair; the gleam of a gem in his ear. His pale face covered in an overgrown stubble that was a few days away from being a beard. She saw the deep set eyes she used to know and the circles beneath them, as pronounced as bruises in the untrustworthy light. His eyebrows were as asymmetrical as she remembered them and that mole on the corner of his mouth… the lips that she’d kissed and never forgotten, because her mind refused to let her forget anything, even when she hated herself for it.

She saw him, a ghost standing there just a few feet from her in a dark room and the world just…  shifted on its axis and she fell off the face of it.


	2. ii.ii

_"‘Aren’t you afraid of my darkness, my dear?’ Hades asked with mischief in his eyes._  
_‘No,‘ Persephone replied, ‘You haven’t even seen mine yet.’"_

 -   _kfg_

This wasn’t real. It  _couldn’t_  be.

He’d  _died_! Oliver was  _dead_. She had made her peace with that fact years ago, for the sake of her own sanity. She’d had to. And then Robert had been found and Felicity hadn’t been proud of herself for resenting him being alive while Oliver wasn’t, but she’d made her peace with that too.

Robert had confirmed it for them. He had stood in the middle of Queen Mansion’s very polished living room, looked at his wife and daughter dead in the eye and told them that Oliver had died at sea. That he drowned in that storm.

( _He’d drowned. Cold and scared and alone, in a violent dark place. Did it hurt? She hadn’t been able to sleep for weeks, after._ )

Robert had come into her office…  

Felicity felt rage starting to bubble up, irrational and hot in her gut, making her hands shake. God, she’d always known that Robert wasn’t the best of men – not even close. She’d known all too well how hard it used to be between him and Oliver, but she couldn’t believe he could have been so… so deliberately  _cruel_! If there had ever been even the smallest chance that Oliver had lived, he should have told them.  _He should have told them_! Everything!

But instead the fucker had come into her  _office_ , where she had felt safest and most comfortable. He had stepped into her space in broad daylight and  _lied to her face_!

 _If you’re not put you to death, I will ruin you_ myself _, Robert_!

He’d sounded so calm. So fucking sorrowful.

‘ _The last time we talked… the very last time, he spoke to me of you_.’

Felicity hadn’t been able to bear it then, same as it kept pressing against her ribcage now, too heavy for her to breathe through.

‘ _Did he suffer_?’

It had seemed so important, somehow… so much time, wondering about it. He came for her to pull her under the dark tide almost every other night.

‘ _No, sweetheart_.’ And Robert’s eyes, so kind. Maybe they had just seemed that way because she’d tried to see Oliver in them. ( _So stupid. Oliver had never been anything like his father, ever. He would have been so fucking_ disappointed _in her_.)

Felicity had thought she was able to tell a lie apart from a truth when she heard one, but apparently she’d never met a more ice-veined liar than Robert Queen. Unlike Malcolm - who possessed no feeling and the absence of them made every imitation of emotion look plastic and stunningly insincere on his face - Robert was very much capable of emotion. He felt everything - and had no scruples about using honest emotion to do dishonest work[[1]](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6647053?view_full_work=true#_ftn1).

It was hard to decide which one of them was worse.

That small shuffle of his feet, so painfully alike to Oliver’s nervous tick. She’d had to look away. She wondered now if he’d done that on purpose, just to unbalance her.

‘ _Felicity… I’m so sorry. I know it’s not the right time. That it will probably never be the right time - but I need your help_.’

And she had helped.                       

She’d been such an idiot. Fuck her MIT degree and her bullshit-meter. She was the most hopeless loser of them all. Such an easy target.

Felicity tried to blink through her tears, tried to shake herself out of it. Thea had kept moving. Digg too was getting up, but Felicity just couldn’t. She could barely even feel her feet at all, let alone stand on them.

Thea was shaking. Felicity could see it all the way from where she was sitting.

“Ollie…”

God, her voice…

Felicity felt her heat skip a beat fall, because his eyes… she didn’t know what she expected to happen. Didn’t know anything, anymore, but the way Oliver looked straight at Thea’s face, right into her wide eyes - without a flicker of recognition crossing his… no, that had not been what she could possibly have expected.

Felicity felt a cold shiver rip up her spine. A man was standing there, yes. A man with Oliver Queen’s face. But she didn’t know what more than that.

… what less.

She scrambled to her feet and hurried to Thea’s side, took the other girl’s hand to stop her. Heavy tears were running down Thea’s face. Felicity felt like a sand castle herself, shaking in front of the oncoming waves.

“Ollie, it’s Thea…” her voice shook and she tried to reach out to him, but both Digg and Felicity tugged her backwards. The look of utter betrayal that Thea send her stung a bit.

“We don’t know what’s going on yet, Thea.”

Thea tugged her hand out of Felicity’s grip, as if those hands that had so often offered solace and comfort were poison now.

“That’s  _Oliver_. Felicity… that’s… that’s my  _brother_! What more is there?”

Felicity looked from Thea to him.

He was so silent and still, looking straight ahead. She wanted her look to pound at his face as hard as her thoughts were hammering against the inside of her forehead. ‘ _Look at me! Look at me!_ ’

But he didn’t. He didn’t even blink. He just stood there.

“I wanted you both to be here tonight because I was sure that Oliver would return, and I wanted you to meet again.”

Felicity tore her eyes away from the ghost and looked at the devil. At least dealing with Malcolm meant grasping for any shred of sense in this mess. He was a small man, his wants were easier. Utterly earthly.

“I know that you were unaware of Oliver’s survival. The moment I could, I wanted to change that.”

_You liar._

“Why isn’t he answering me?” Thea asked, glaring at Malcolm with growing. “What have you done to him?”

“I have done nothing.” Malcolm said calmly. “I have only been Ra’s for a short time. I had no control over what happened before my coming.”

Felicity just shook her head. It was as if his words hit a barrier in her head and dissolved into gibberish. She couldn’t make sense of them. Her mind was working furiously, trying to find a pattern that would tell her a new story. Something that they had been missing till now, something… But as she tried to make sense of the death not being as permanent as she’d first thought, Malcolm spoke and Oliver, along with the men and women at his sides, started walking out.

Thea gasped and immediately reached for her brother, calling his name again.

“Thea, don’t!”

But it was too late – they were already on her, grasping at her arms to keep her from touching her brother. The brother that didn’t turn when she yelped in surprise and then turned her scorching fury at the man holding her. Even though pale and missing the dark makeup she usually wore, she looked fierce as ever. Thea bared her teeth, curled her legs up to gather momentum and then threw her whole weight forward to unbalance her captor. She elbowed him in the side, slammed the back of her head hard against his face and broke the arm that had been holding her as she untangled herself. She probably tore at her stitches in the mean time, Felicity noted absently, as Digg took down the other man that tried attack Thea behind her back.

They stood no chance. There were too many of them.

Thea screamed Oliver’s name and it came back to her an empty echo, as she was shoved to her knees. Her sob as the man behind her pulled at her injured arm crawled right beneath Felicity’s skin and  _singed_.

She didn’t think. This was a zero sum game anyway, and Felicity had realized that before any of this unfolded. She threw herself on the man holding Thea down and scratched her uneven nails down his face, pressing against the squishiness of his eyes until he screamed. The last thing Felicity saw before a something very hard connected with the side of her head, was Oliver’s half-turned face and the impassive look on it.

+

Felicity felt the pain before she even opened her eyes. Her head was throbbing so hard she could feel her heartbeat on her forehead, splitting her skull in a straight line from there and down the back of her head.

She groaned, and immediately felt John’s hand on hers.

“It’s ok,” he said, voice low. Felicity tried to nod, but it heightened the sharp hurt, so she gave up on that and squeezed Digg’s hand a bit tighter instead. She opened her eyes slowly.

“Where’s Thea?”

Digg sighed. “Sleeping. They hit her with some sort of sedative. …I’m so sorry, Felicity.”

Felicity sighed and tried to pull herself to a sitting position.

“Don’t be sorry for anything John. There was nothing you could have done.” She said as she felt the split on her lip gingerly. The whole left side of her face felt on fire.

She’d never been hit by someone’s fist before…

Felicity eyed the room, Thea’s sleeping form beside her in the bed and the black eye that was swiftly swelling up on Digg’s face.

She knew what she had to do… but she was scared. So fucking afraid to take that step. There was anger there, crawling along her veins, too. At being outsmarted, manipulated. Lied to. Fucking punched unconscious!

But she couldn’t hold on to that either. She needed clarity right now.

“There’s someone at the door, isn’t there?”

Digg seemed surprised by her question, but he nodded. “One of Merlyn’s men. As if we have any chance of going anywhere.”

Felicity shook her head. “That’s not why he’s there.”

She swung her legs on the side of the bed. The cold stone made her bare toes curl in.

“I have to talk to Malcolm.” Felicity said without preamble.

Digg’s incredulous frown was all too apt, Felicity knew. But she had a reason.

“And say what?”

“We didn’t end up here by chance John. I don’t believe that anymore.” Digg’s face was clouded over by confusion, but Felicity took his hand.

“Moira and Robert would never had send their daughter here, of they thought it dangerous.” Digg reminded her.

Too true.

“I don’t think they know. None of us knew. And Robert never understood the kind of monster Malcolm is anyway.” She sighed. It’s not like she’d let them know. Tommy had been too ashamed, and Felicity… felicity had been too angry at them for not seeing it. Not caring.

“I need you to trust me, Digg.” She looked up, met his eyes. “One last time.”

“Won’t be the last. And I do. But I don’t see how this could help. He’s already hurt you twice, I don’t want him anywhere near any of us.”

Felicity smile joylessly. It hurt. “Too bad we’re stuck in here, huh.”

+

He was waiting for her at a table set for two. Felicity wasn’t surprised in the least.

“Felicity.”

She still hated the way he said her name.

She sat down before he could ask her to. A muscle at the corner of his jaw twitched. Absently she wondered in what creative ways he would chose to inflict punishment now that he had so many variations of it on his hands.

“What do you want Malcolm? Really, this time.”

His smiles had always made him look serpentine, but he either didn’t know or didn’t care.

“Right to the point, as ever. One of your most charming traits.”

Felicity gritted her teeth, tried to keep her composure as if this was just another QC board meeting and she had to present another trimester project for the Applied Sciences Division. She slumped a little though, in a way that she had grown out of years ago, but that would remind him of the impatient teenager she used to be - dressed in black from head to toe, with a smart mouth and an attitude problem that had an attitude problem.

Because if he wanted to play games, so could she. Felicity didn’t think she could ever be as good as Malcolm was at them, but she had spent too many years at Moira Queen’s side not to have learned a thing or two about manipulation. The fact that there was never much love lost between her and Moira didn’t change that.

“I suppose you have already realized that there is a reason you’re here.”

 _No shit, Sherlock_.

Felicity looked at him a long time. He was waiting for her to ask him what that reason was, give him the chance to explain her things. Fuck his subtle games of control.

_Fuck you._

She’d already asked the only question she needed him to answer.

“You’re the one responsible for unmasking Robert and the rest of us,” she said instead, the pieces falling into place almost as if the curtain had been lifted. Suddenly she could see it all. “A big risk, considering all the times we were almost killed in the last five days. Or were the assassination attempts from you as well.” She huffed. Of course they were. Pushing the current where he needs it to go. “I know  _you_  reached to Moira to offer to keep us ‘safe’ and not the other way around, so  _what_  do you  _want_?”

“It’s always amused me how much you despise me for my arrogance, without once realizing you are exactly the same.” Malcolm said, words mixing with the underlying laughter. “ _Worse_  even! I know perfectly well I’m an arrogant man. You, my dear stepdaughter, are far blinder.”

Felicity didn’t give him the satisfaction of reacting. He only called her that because he knew how much she hated it.

“You think that just because I know I’m smarter than most people, I would also assume to be right about most things as well.”

He raised his eyebrows. “And you don’t?”

“Oh, I do. But I trust statistics and laws of probability more than I trust opinion, even when it’s mine.” Felicity said simply.

Thea and John were both excellent fighters, but Malcolm had plenty of those here that were even better. It could be because of Diggle’s connection to Argus. Felicity had considered it. But it hadn’t been Lyla he had dangled in front of them earlier than night, like a chunk of meat in the water.

No – it had been Oliver.

The thought still burned somewhere between her fourth and fifth rib, relentless. Felicity pushed that anger down.

 _Calm. Calm and steady_.

No, this was about her, and the only thing she had to offer that was in not-so-common supply was her technical skills. Malcolm knew them well.

She wasn’t about to explain her reasoning to Malcolm though. It would be a waste of time and she didn’t feel like sharing an single ounce of herself with him.

“You think I put on all that circus and risked getting my long time friend killed just to get you here? I could have snatched you out of your home any time I wanted.”

“I’m honestly surprised that you didn’t,” she said, as if the notion barely affected her. The possibility chilled her, but at the same time, Felicity couldn’t fathom a reason why he hadn’t.

Malcolm tilted his head to the side, linking his fingers together.

“I find kidnappings… distasteful.”

Felicity clenched her jaw tight to keep the words in.

_Bullshit, oh my god!_

There might things he found distasteful, but taking hold of someone’s person and agency like that was not one of them. Malcolm  _lived_  for that kind of sick shit. But he was also familiar with her stubbornness. She wasn’t naïve enough to think that that would have stopped Malcolm from hurting her to get what she wanted though. Nor was she so delusional to fancy herself unbreakable. That was ridiculous. Working with Robert the past year had taught Felicity a lot about the persuasive power of pain and fear. Felicity was not strong enough to resist, but she did know herself and… and so did Malcolm, she realized. He knew her well enough to be aware that she had a disgusting vindictive streak. Punishing her, when she had been a teen in his care with a mother who traveled too much for her job, had only led to raging retaliation and bitter resentment. He couldn’t hurt her and then to put her in front of a computer without grave consequences to his person.

Which meant he didn’t want to risk it. He wanted certainty… and her full compliance.

The more Felicity thought about this, the more she became convinced that, though the plan had been by far too complicated, the theme throughout it mirrored who Malcolm was perfectly. Whenever he wanted something but needed someone else to do it for him, he made it so that the goal was shared. Either mutual benefit, or – preferably – mutual destruction. And he knew that she wouldn’t piss on him even if he were on fire, so he had found the perfect way to make sure she worked for what he wanted as if she wanted it as hard as he did.

There were only three reason why Felicity would do anything at all for Malcolm.

Well… four, actually. Four  _people_.

Two of them were waiting for her in a shared room. The third was halfway across the world, loved by a woman who was a literal force of nature and who would keep him safe from anything. Even from Malcolm. And the fourth… he was god knew where inside this labyrinth of a fortress, breathing and walking around with eyes and lips she used to love who looked no more alive now than they had been to her mere days ago.

It didn’t really matter who was wearing Oliver’s face though.  

…Malcolm had probably known that too.

“It is unprecedented you know, having guests like you and your friends in this mountain. But I allowed it, for the sake of the long time friendship I share with Robert, and my fondness for you and Thea both… no matter how unappreciated. After all, I did once call you daughter.”

Felicity couldn’t hide her disgust. “I thank god I was never your daughter every time you cross my mind, Malcolm.”

He laughed. “Yes, I imagine you do.”

She hated the way his eyes glinted as they fixed on her face. Hated the mocking tilt of that smile, which had taught her to mistrust everyone who ever smiled at her.

“I’ve always liked you Felicity. You have spirit. I do prefer obedience, but you can be quite amusing.”

_Amusing…_

“Now, to the point, as you so clearly prefer.” He linked his hands together, leaned forward. “There is this one nuisance that I need to take care of, and for which I need your  _particular_  skills. I think that small service is a fair exchange for your safety here.” Malcolm finally said. His smile stretched wider, knowing eyes fixed on hers, glinting in the firelight. “And for that  _other_ thing you’re now about to ask me.”

She never stood a chance, did she?

“Did Robert know?” that mattered. It mattered to how deep she would ebb her nails when she tried to claw his face.

“No.”

“Why is he here? How?”

“I imagine he survived, and the league picked him up. Kept him alive.”

“And a prisoner.” Her distain was obvious in the twist of her mouth.

It seemed to amuse him, as her every open show of emotion ever had.

“What makes you think he’s a prisoner?”

Her heart fell so hard she thought she might have to gather herself off the floor, when she reminded herself with all the strength left to her that he was paying with her. He knew her soft spots, her hurts and old sores. He knew where to press.

_Don’t you fucking give him the satisfaction! Don’t you dare!_

_You fucker…_

He smiled as if he could actually hear the insults she kept hurting at him silently.

“The League is not exactly known for… entertaining guests. Or saving lives. There is a price for everything, within these walls.”

Of course there was.

“What happened to him?” the one question she was too afraid to ask but that couldn’t stand not knowing the answer to.

“The previous Ra’s wanted obedience in all things. And when he could not get it, he had methods to ensure it.”

She felt like she was standing five inches behind herself. listening to his words with someone else’s ears.

“The more stubborn the subject, the more… abrasive the method.” Malcolm continued and she turned the full force of her hatred to him.

“This must be like the real-life version of a wet dream to you, isn’t it?”

His eyes hardened just a fraction. “Now, now. No need for that kind of language, Felicity.”

“No need to be fake with me, Malcolm. Loosen up. Let the horns show.” She taunted, against her better reason.

“I assure you I do not enjoy the thought of Oliver’s pain, and I did all I could to teach him how to avoid it. But, as you must be well familiar with – Oliver is not one to be easily persuaded.”

Felicity looked away. She’d had enough of his games.

“I want you to let Oliver go.  _Forever_.”

Malcolm huffed, and for the first time the amusement on his face was real. “I already told you. I am not holding him against his will.”

Like she’d ever believe that.

“Neither you nor anyone related in any way shape of form to you - or this place - will ever contact him again. And if you do, or if I get the sense that you’re going to double cross us, while I hack into whatever it is you want me to hack, I’ll send a little message to Amanda Waller with the exact coordinates of this hellhole.” Felicity tilted her head and smiled. She couldn’t hide the way her hands were shaking, or how emotion made her eyes shine but she would see this through. “You know the Wall’s preferred method of dealing with a nuisance, don’t you Malcolm?”

The Wall would blow this whole mountain sky high because the she didn’t give a fuck about anything other than neat solutions.

“There is no need for threats here, Felicity.” He smiled as if the notion alone amused him, but his eyes were cold. “As I said, I’m perfectly willing to give you what you want, if you do the same.”

“No, what you’re willing to do is let me know that you can hurt me if you want to, because you know how.” She wasn’t going to let anything be lost in translation here. “But you misunderstand Malcolm: that was no threat. That was me reminding you that I know how to hurt you too.”

The way he leaned back in his chair might have been imperious, but Felicity knew the real danger was in the emptiness of his eyes when he spoke.

“I doubt it.”

She hated him so much she would have gladly slit his throat right there. “You shouldn’t. I learned from the best.”

-

[[1]](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6647053?view_full_work=true#_ftnref1) GoT reference. A quote by Tyrion Lannister, season 5.


	3. ii.iii

_Everything you needed to know I told you without speaking. I watched you the way someone who has never known fire watches the grey dawn ignite. I touched you the way a wild animal walks into a thresher. I held your name in my mouth the way the river holds the moon."_

_— NATALIE WEE, ( 12 / ? )_

It had been the middle of the day when the Gambit left the Starling City harbor – just a breath after lunch. Felicity had barely made it there in time, but he remembered the relief he’d felt when he’d seen.

She had been wearing a flirty red blouse, the ends of it tucked into her white pencil skirt. She may have dropped the goth look, but she was still just as noticeable. No longer pitch-black, her hair was still just as eye-catching, falling in shiny waves around her face and shoulders, their natural gold-brown shade almost as warm as her smile. Oliver caught of her bright yellow purse and matching heels and his smile became even wider. Felicity, always with the bold choices.

He stepped away from his parents, arms already open, ready to catch her when she’d jumped into them. She did, held him close and tight as if she hadn’t seen him in ages, when she’d only been gone to Metropolis for two days.

“You made it.”

The relief in his voice had made her chest ache. But instead of saying anything, she chuckled, there against the side of his neck where she’d pressed her face ( _and then a bright-pink kiss too_ ).

“I made it.” She pulled back to look at him then, a hand still against his face, the side of his neck. “Couldn’t very well miss your first international business trip, could I? How does it feel to be the first representative of ‘ _Firestorm_ ’ overseas?”

His smile faltered a bit. Her hand traveled down his arm, fingers tightening around his bicep.

“You’re gonna do fine. You know every in and out of our company better than anyone and people love you the moment they meet you, because you understand them.” Her hand slipped down his chest, soothing patterns over his heart, her eyes wide and honest. “You’ll do great, Oliver.”

He shuffled his feet and glanced away, smiling in that particular way that reminded her he liked knowing he was valued. But it didn’t quite touch his eyes this time.

“That’s not really what I’m worried about.”

Felicity winced. Yeah, she knew that. “You’ll do fine with  _that_  too.”

He raised one eyebrow at her, a humorless smile curling his lips.

“Just… try not to kill each other.” Felicity deadpanned.

Amusement made its way back in his eyes. “Right. Always setting realistic goals, huh Smoak?”

She pursed her lips. “I believe in being practical.”

“Don’t I know it. I think I have been on your pro-cons lists a couple of times.”

She poked his chest, offended. “Do  _not_  mock the pro-cons lists!”

He would have raised his hands in his own defense, palms out, if they weren’t so comfortable where he’d linked them at the small of her back, to bring her closer.

“Never have since second year of college.”

“Wait, mine or yours?”

He groaned but he was smiling wide. “Wow! Harsh, Smoak.”

“Why thank you.”

“Anytime.”

“And besides, we have rules about murder.”  

“Right.”

And it was true. ‘ _No murders unless she was around to help him hide the bodies._ ’ As far as stupidity deterrents went, it had worked well during their teenage years. Even more so later on.

“Also, only a finite number of suspects on a ship.” Felicity reminded him, pursing her lips. It was the kind of expression Oliver hadn’t been able to look at without wanting to kiss in a while. And it was in moments like these, when she could remind him there was cheerfulness and lightness to the world, even when he forgot, that he remember how deep his love for her went, how intricately linked to his being it was. Almost half their lives had been lived around each other, which was why it was so hard for Oliver to really know when he’d started falling for her. Sometimes he thought there hadn’t even been any falling involved at all. No tipping point that he had jumped from, out of which he could pinpoint a single moment. It hadn’t been like that for him.

Love for Felicity had snuck up on him. To his shame now, it seemed to had taken a long time to get there and even longer to realize where he was.

But this also meant that they knew each other well. Too well for Felicity to miss the tension bunched along his shoulders and the guarded look in his eyes. It made Felicity wish she had insisted a lot harder on postponing that meeting with Lucius Fox, so she could go with him. She would be a shit conciliator, seeing that there was no love lost between her and Robert  _at all_ , but at least Oliver wouldn’t be alone.

Sometimes it felt like that was the core of their relationship: that stubborn refusal to abandon each other.

“Maybe if we try to limit the conversation on safer things… the weather, or something.”

“Horses, cars,  _Thea_. Also good topics.” Felicity suggested.

Oliver sighed. “We never agree on anything when it comes to Thea.”

“You agree that you both love her very much. Just… maybe don’t touch on the ‘ _how’_.”

His smile turned sardonic. “That sums up all safe ways to talk to my dad. ‘How-s’ are not Rober Queen’s favorite questions.”

“He’s not a big fan of ‘why’ either.”

When he didn’t smile as sincerely as she would have liked, Felicity stepped a bit closer, until they were standing toe to toe.

“Oliver… You do know that you don’t owe him anything, right?”

Oliver gulped, but didn’t say anythin.

“You don’t. Not a second chance, or a third, or even to listen to him. You don’t owe him any of your goodness, Oliver.”

Oliver sighed. “Yeah, I know. This isn’t about that.”

Though truth be told, most time Oliver wasn’t sure what it really was about.

He had never gotten along with his father and that was no secret. They clashed on fundamental levels of their personalities and Oliver had never quite figured out how to deal with that in a way that didn’t leave him feeling like a failure or angry or resentful enough to want to smash to pieces everything his father ever created. There used to be a time when he resented Robert Queen as hard as he tried to please him, and the only way he’d known how to do that was to imitate him in the worst ways.

Those had been some of the most hollow and lonely years of his life. 

“Well, let’s look at the bright side: it’s a  _big_  yacht. Lots of places to avoid him in.” Oliver reminded himself.

“Pretentiousness has its benefits.” Felicity said with a ‘I suppose’ shrug.

“Don’t let my mother hear you say that.”

She didn’t even blink. “She’s heard worst, don’t worry.”

He pinched her side lightly, making her laugh.

The truth was that neither of them knew what to think about Robert’s insistence on taking the Gambit for this trip.

Felicity considered herself optimistic by nature - and choice - but forgiving people who hurt her was a habit she’d been trained out of early. And she held an even harder line for those who hurt people she loved. So no, she wasn’t inclined to give Robert Queen a second chance; not even  _half_  of one.

But Oliver was different.

He’d been armoring his kindness with brashness and coolness for years, but for someone who knew him the way Felicity did, his nature was transparent. Above anything else, what Oliver wanted was to be loved.

It had felt predictable, the way Oliver had reacted to his father’s request: with both suspicion and hope. If it had been anyone else but Oliver, she might have pointed out the futility of the second. She hadn’t, of course.

She may have never had a gentle heart, but she did know love.

It wasn’t all bad, though. They had each other and Oliver had Thea, still looked at Oliver like he was her hero. And Thea got on with Felicity like a house on fire - with Tommy adding in the gasoline, Laurel pinching the bridge of her nose as she watched and Sara laughing about it all from the sidelines, throwing in the occasional piece of wood at the flames. Felicity even managed to keep it smooth with Moira most of the time. Robert… a little less. They showed her the greatest acceptance people as stubborn as the Queens were capable of: growing used to her nature without the slightest acceptance of it.

That is, until four years ago, when a 21 year old and fresh-out-of-MIT Felicity persuaded Tommy and Oliver into creating ‘Firestorm’.

The Queens had cooled towards her considerably then, but they were all civil, for civility’s sake. Felicity didn’t really care about their approval and Oliver… well, Oliver seemed to had gotten himself to a point where not having it didn’t hurt quite as much anymore. 

Felicity pulled on the lapel of his light jacket just a bit to get his attention.

“You can always bail and just  _fly_  to China, you know.”

But she knew even before he looked up with a small smile, that he wouldn’t. He’d never been one to give up in front of a challenge. And hope… hope had always been too bright in him, no matter how hard he tried to hide it.

That was precious. Felicity loved him for it. And more than anything, she didn’t want him hurt because of it, by someone callous enough to see it as a weakness.

A whispering thought brushed by her, dark and unforgiving. She would make Robert regret the day he was born if, because of him, Oliver got back to her in any less perfect of a condition than he was before he left. She  _might_  have hinted at that, very calmly, a few days before her trip to Metropolis. The way Robert’s eyes had fixed on her in open surprise had been amusing. The little smile on the corner of Moira’s lips though had been a lot more disconcerting.

Those two were weird.

Oliver’s eyes softened as he looked her over.

“When I get back, we could circle back to that discussion we started last night.”

She felt her heart flutter.

“I don’t think the City docs as you’re leaving is the best place to talk about real-estate, Oliver.”

“As good a places as any.” But his teasing subsided fairly quickly, serious blue eyes setting on her face. “What’s the matter, Smoak? Really, this time. I don’t want to leave without knowing.”

Felicity shifted on her feet a little bit, but then decided she might as well get it all out now. It’s not like any of this was going to change in three weeks he would be away.

“I’m all for living together…”

“Have been for two years now.”

“Yes I have.” She nodded. “But buying a place is… it’s a big decision, Oliver.”

It was an awfully  _permanent_  decision. She’d known that’s where they’d been heading for a while… she did know. They’d decided – one of those silent decisions thing they did sometimes – to take it easy, for her sake.

Oliver knew all the ways she spooked and why.

“Doesn’t seem like it to me. We pick a place, we put both our names on a piece of paper, move in. Easy.” He smiled a little, leaned in close. “I seem to remember us having a conversation awfully like this one when were rented our own place.”

They had. She’d been so frantic on the rent-or-buy issue. And he’d been so calm. It freaked her out sometimes, how calm he could be about the stuff that scared the hell out of her.  

Freaked and calmed her at the same time.

She looked up and it’s as if he could read the thought in her eyes. She saw the understanding as it settled on his face, felt it in the way he pulled her just a little bit closer. There was something sad in his smile, something that tugged between her ribs and made her want to  rush the words out, all her feelings, even as he brushed her hair over her shoulder.

“We can wait, if you want.”

She shook her head, her heart slipping through her fingers. “I don’t want to make you wait.”

She didn’t! This was literally the stupidest thing ever, why was she like this?

… but she was.

“I don’t want to make you rush.” It slipped out of his lips as if it had been on the tip of his tongue the whole time.

Right. Of course not.

She tightened her grip around his arms, leaned her head on his chest. She would have kissed him there the way she usually did but she didn’t want to stain his pristine white button-down.

It was funny sometimes how she used to think he was all grand gestures, hollowed out meanings. He never had been. Or maybe once. Maybe.

Now Oliver was able to take her hand and help her step into the quietest moment in the room. The one that stopped its heart.

“Does it bother you?” The frown on his face encouraged her to be more specific and she swallowed her fear and let the words come out. “That I always seem to be one step behind you.”

“You’re fifty steps ahead of everyone else every other time. It seems the least I can do to wait for you once in a while.”

She tilted her head the way she did sometimes, without a smile or a wiggle of eyebrows, to let him know that she needed an answer, not his smart way around one. An honest answer.

“So it gets a little lonely sometimes, till you get there, but I know you’ll always get there.”

Felicity felt her tears sting, but she breathed deep and held them back.

“You know I  _want_  to be with you, right?” the words can out so desperate that for a moment she was embarrassed and so self-conscious that she felt the heat rise at the back of her neck and burn on her cheeks.

He nodded slowly, his eyes were so oft and his smile so sweet that she could actually breathe again.

“And that I trust you.”

His lips twitched up. He contained it, though he couldn’t hide the delight he felt. He had gotten so used to waiting for people to count on him he was always surprised when he didn’t really have to. She trusted what they had enough to be wholly in it.

Her fear wasn’t real. It was remnants of a feeling she’d once had, and in which she’d grown so comfortable in, that its absence was strange now.

“Good to know. And you know I’m not going anywhere, right?”

She felt her eyes well up and closed them.

“Yeah. Yes, I do.” She’d known it a while. Because though in this world there were things that never changed, luckily, other things did.

Oliver leaned back and took a good look at her.

“If we ever want to do better than our parents, we’re gonna have to work for it.” Neither of them had voiced that fear they both shared quite so bluntly before. But it was still true.  “And stop being afraid we’ll become them.”

Felicity’s arms slipped around his waist, linking her hands at the small of his back. It always made him lean into her, their foreheads almost brushing together. And if they swayed in place just a little bit, neither of them cared.

“We’ve got this. Right?”

Oliver smiled.

“Right.” he said with a decided nod. “And we have time to figure it out. This is just the beginning, remember?”

“Yeah?” Her voice was shaky, honest. It made him want to wrap himself around her.

They both had such frail insides, really, but he’d never in his life trusted anyone more than he trusted her to be tender with his. And it was a privilege to be able to be trusted with hers too, like this. Open and without pretense.

This was what it meant to be someone’s safe place.

He felt sometimes like he’d never had that his whole life before he found it with her.

Oliver nodded once. “Yeah.”

“I’ll call Jensen so that he can line up some properties for us to look through when you get back.”

“City apartment or townhouse – that is the question.” Oliver reminded her and she groaned softly, flopping her head against his chest again.

“Let’s just… have options. Options are good.”

“You’re already making a slit aren’t you?”

And she could tell he was laughing at her on the inside because it was in his voice. She poked him in the ribs, making him squirm.

“By the way – you still haven’t told me where we’re going for our anniversary.” She said, poking him again.

“No I haven’t. It’s a surprise.”

His cheeky smile wouldn’t save him ( _though the spark in his eyes might_ ).

“I don’t like surprises.” Felicity reminded him.

“You’ll love this one.”

The sheer happiness of his smile might have been reassuring but that cheeky wink really wasn’t.

From the distance, they both heard Robert calling him.

This was the part Felicity hated the most. She’d never known how to say goodbye, or how to take one without making it feel like an open wound.

“I love you.”

When her only response was a shaking breath against his lips, Oliver smiled. He knew Felicity well enough to know that she would never say it back if it was meant to be ‘goodbye’. She didn’t even like saying it back when it meant ‘I’ll see you later.’

His smile stretched a bit wider. “And you love me too, don’t you?”

She nodded before the words even were fully out of his mouth.

“Yeah. Yes, I do.” She smiles wide as she said it, both happy and embarrassed of the strange quirks that dictated her words, her actions.

He understood them though. He loved those too.

One of her hands sneaked up to the back of his neck then, just as she tilted her face up for him, waiting for a kiss that did not delay a moment. She might not say it back sometimes, but Oliver had always known she loved him: by the way she’d touch him, the way she’d kiss him. With every bit of passion she had in her, and tenderness too, making everything feel as soft and warm as the sun against his face. She surrounding him with moments of deep privacy, suspend him in them. A love and connection more real than anything. He learned the meaning of intimate over and over again when she’d kiss him. Kisses that felt as if she had been meant to give them, and he had been born for.

He’d never doubted her in love, because everything he needed to hear, she’d told him without speaking. All her wordless language had come thorough to him more clearly than anyone who had ever spoken to him before. He’d never felt unsure of this, because every time she’d touched him, he’d felt like he belonged. 


End file.
